Interview

TLC Reveal Why They Rejected Britney Spears’ Biggest Hit!

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2018 marks the 20th anniversary since the birth of one of the biggest songs in music history, ‘Baby One More Time‘, which launched the career of Britney Spears!

Max Martin, the writer and co-producer of ‘Baby’ was convinced he’d written an R&B song (“Pop music with a flavour – what we call R&B in Sweden, what you guys [in America] say is pop,” sent the song, then called Hit Me Baby (One More Time), to TLC who rejected it.

While TLC interpreted the lyrics as alluding to domestic violence, they actually represented Martin’s attempts at American slang, believing “hit me” could seamlessly replace “call me”.

This is a large part of the reason the song wasn’t accepted by the girls in TLC. “I was like: ‘I like the song but do I think it’s a hit? Do I think it’s TLC?’ said T-Boz.

“I’m not saying ‘hit me baby.’ No disrespect to Britney,” T-Boz continues on her initial thought of the song. “It’s good for her. But was I going to say ‘hit me baby one more time’? Hell no!”

“Understand we’re not just passing up hits,” Chilli added. It just wasn’t a song that fit in the direction TLC was aiming for.

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“That’s not even my subject of conversation, so you know, it worked for her, I’m happy for her, I like Britney,” T-Boz explained.

“Every song isn’t good for each artist, and when you’re a real artist you know what you believe in and what you really want to sing. So, I’m clear that it was a hit, but I’m also clear that it wasn’t for TLC.”

Nonetheless, TLC later went on to record their own timeless smash that year to add to their catalog in the form of 1999’s record breaking ‘No Scrubs‘.

Interview excerpts from MTV News in 2013.
Interview

TLC on Cardi B and Why They Don’t Celebrate Left Eye’s Passing

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TLC sat down with Beats 1 on April 25, 2018, the 16th anniversary of the passing of the beloved Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes.

On Cardi B Paying Them Homage

T-Boz: “I know she wore my outfits at the Grammys and she wore Lisa’s hair. It was our whole Grammys-TLC feel when we were on stage, and she said Left Eye on one song, and paid homage to TLC on another song — our “Creep” song and then our name, too. She did it twice and she also paid us love on our page. So a lot of love — it was awesome.”

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On TLC’s Legacy

T-Boz: “It’s really an honor. You never think people are going to be — like, you always wish that, you want that. We would always say, ‘we want to be trendsetters. We want little girls to dress like us.’ But when you actually see them do it for Halloween, and have birthday parties, and generations — the grandma, the mom, and the daughter — all at the concerts. It’s really amazing. We’re blessed to be 25 years in, and people are still doing it.”

Chilli: “We are really blessed. And like she said, as an artist when you’re new coming out, your dream is to be able to have that type of effect — a positive one — on everybody, and to have that longevity. You don’t know if that’s going to be your story, so time tells that, and it has. It’s been 20 plus years, and even Bruno Mars, for that matter — the video that he had featuring Cardi B — it was almost like our “Ain’t Too Proud To Beg” video, and he had on a TLC t-shirt! It’s amazing and it’s a blessing for us to see that. It makes us feel really good and lets us know, OK we did it right. We’re still doing it, so yes, it is awesome.”

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On The Anniversary of Left Eye’s Passing

Chilli: “First of all, when you think of the word anniversary — I mean, I know that it’s a date that something took place. But when you think about that, you think of happy times.

When people celebrate the anniversary of a wedding, or a marriage, or a relationship of any kind, and it seems like to me it’s all something cheerful, and there’s nothing cheerful to me about her passing. I mean nothing. We don’t go out of our way to do anything like that. I mean, when her birthday comes around, yes, we talk about that, but not the death.”

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T-Boz: “But we celebrate it all year round. I mean really because we always incorporate her in everything we do. We always keep her memory alive. We showcase the great things, like why people loved her. So yeah, like when anybody else’s mom or sister dies, I don’t know a lot of people who celebrate cake or anything.”

 

Anniversary, Music

DJ Starting From Scratch Presents: 25 Years of TLC

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In February of 1992, we were introduced to a new girl group that broke all the rules, in every sense. They looked different, they sounded different, they spoke their minds & they turned the music scene on it’s a**.

The group was TLC & they became the best-selling American girl group of all time with 65 million records sold worldwide. Incredible. I wanted to make sure that I got this tribute out before March kicked in & thankfully I made it just before the buzzer.

So here it is. DJ Starting From Scratch Presents: 25 Years of TLC, a tribute mix.

I included the ENTIRE first album & I surrounded it with all my favourite TLC songs, along with a few solo gems & features. This is for all the true TLC fans out there that realize there is much more to this amazing group than just No Scrubs.

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CLICK HERE FOR ALTERNATIVE LINK
Track List:
1. INTRO
2. AIN’T 2 PROUD 2 BEG REMIX
3. WHAT ABOUT YOUR FRIENDS
4. GET IT UP REMIX
5. HIS STORY
6. COME GET SOME (SFS RMX) 7. U KNOW WHAT’S UP – DONELL JONES & LISA ‘LEFT EYE’ LOPES 8. HANDS UP RMX
9. DAS DA WAY WE LIKE EM
10. THIS IS HOW IT SHOULD BE DONE
11. HAT 2 DA BACK
12. BAD BY MYSELF
13. SHOCK DAT MONKEY
14. DEPEND ON MYSELF
15. TLC INTERVIEW (INTERLUDE)
16. WATERFALLS
17. DIGGIN ON YOU (SOULPOWER RMX)
18. HATERS
19. SOMETHIN YOU WANNA KNOW
20. BABY BABY BABY
21. I’M GOOD AT BEING BAD
22. UNPRETTY
23. GHETTO LOVE – DA BRAT & T-BOZ (SFS RMX)
24. NO SCRUBS
25. TOUCH MYSELF (SO SO DEF RMX)
26. LET’S JUST DO IT – LISA ‘LEFT EYE’ LOPES, TLC & MISSY ELLIOTT
27. CASE OF THE FAKE PEOPLE
28. KICK YOUR GAME RMX – TLC & CRAIG MACK
29. HOW DO YOU LIKE IT (GANGSTA MIX) – KEITH SWEAT & LISA ‘LEFT EYE’ LOPES
30. DIRTY DIRTY (SFS RMX)
31. GIRL TALK
32. SWITCH
33. IF I WAS YOUR GIRLFRIEND
34. JOY RIDE
35. MEANT TO BE
36. CREEP
37. NOT TONIGHT – LIL KIM, ANGIE MARTINEZ, DA BRAT, LEFT EYE & MISSY ELLIOTT
38. RED LIGHT SPECIAL